<p>Does the location of your school greatly affect your job prospects? Does Seattle/California/Maryland area have much better job prospects? Is it worth going to a school in these areas at the cost of greater tuition expenses?</p>
<p>There are software jobs everywhere.</p>
<p>There are software jobs everywhere.</p>
<p>There are software jobs everywhere.</p>
<p>There are software jobs everywhere.</p>
<p>:::smacks thread:::</p>
<p>Yes, there are software jobs everywhere. However, there may be more different companies to work at in some areas, so if you are working at an unsatisfactory employer, you may have more options to change employers in some areas.</p>
<p>Of course, even if you are at a school far away from a place you like to work, you can still try to find companies to apply to in the place you like to work. It will take more job searching work than just waiting for them to come to the career center.</p>
<p>Thanks a lot UCB, that’s kind of what I was getting at. Let’s say I want to work in defense, a lot of defense/national security jobs are in Maryland area. My question is, do defense/natural security jobs PREFER U-Maryland and JKU students, or do they just mostly recruit there because of convenience?</p>
<p>Local recruiting, particularly by smaller companies, is typically convenience recruiting. No need to fly recruiters to campuses, no need to fly candidates in for on-site interviews.</p>
<p>limabrad, you are asking an interesting question. I agree with what ucbalumnus said.</p>
<p>It doesn’t really matter as much as it did 20 years ago. Best way to increase your chances is by doing summer internships after sophomore and junior years.</p>
<p>Some students find it works best to get a summer internship near campus and take advantage of already paying on an annual lease. But there’s no guarantee that would work out.</p>
<p>There are software jobs everywhere.</p>
<p>Limabrad “Let’s say I want to work in defense, a lot of defense/national security jobs are in Maryland area. My question is, do defense/natural security jobs PREFER U-Maryland and JKU students, or do they just mostly recruit there because of convenience?”</p>
<p>No they do not prefer U-Maryland and JHU students. A large defense company or national security agency will recruit nationwide. A smaller defense contractor would likely recruit at UMD-College Park, UMBC, George Mason, JMU, UVA, Virginia Tech, W&M, GW, Georgetown, Penn State etc. They don’t need to fly out to California to recruit talent if there is a sufficient pool of talent locally. There also have to be enough students interested in working for the company (lots of local talent but few takers means you have to cast a wider net).</p>
<p>The simplistic explanation above describes the general approach of most companies. In the real world it’s more complicated. For example, even though a smaller Maryland company might not recruit in California that doesn’t mean they won’t hire there (the applicant would have to contact the company rather than the other way around). Or, if there are several attractive candidates a company may make a special trip outside of its normal area, e.g., when I was in grad school I was able to entice a Texas company to come to recruit at my school even though Virginia was outside their normal search area.</p>
<p>But there are software jobs everywhere!</p>
<p>There are software jobs everywhere. Employers will fly out to job fairs if your school is good enough in CS.</p>
<p>I can tell you the vast majority of the cs majors at my wife’s previously very small software company came from the midwest. A lot of that is because the former recruiter’s daughter went to school out there and he’d recruit when he went out to visit. It really can be that simple. </p>
<p>They aren’t small now, but that’s because the talent+product they have allowed them to grow precipitously. That said, I have had to google half of the schools these cs people came from because I had never heard of them (all LAS and lesser known state schools). Only two from local schools, one hopkins and one umuc (not umcp).</p>
<p>tl;dr: no you don’t have to go to school near the area you want to work.</p>
<p>Although, there are software jobs everywhere.</p>
<p>Here are some posts by someone who found a LinkedIn function* that shows the schools listed by LinkedIn users who list working at particular companies:</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1523605-schools-wealthy-elite-15.html#post16148463[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1523605-schools-wealthy-elite-15.html#post16148463</a>
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/engineering-majors/1496714-undergrad-cs-starting-salaries-why-huge-difference-between-colleges-4.html#post15915755[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/engineering-majors/1496714-undergrad-cs-starting-salaries-why-huge-difference-between-colleges-4.html#post15915755</a></p>
<p>Note that apparently local bias.</p>
<p>*Is this a premium subscription function, or a well-hidden function in the normal free account?</p>
<p>Since, I have been reading these brand-name/prestige type of threads, I make it a point to take survey (whenever I can) of the different number of schools represented at that infamous federal agency called “No Such Agency”. Let’s just say that EVERY state “flagship” school is represented at least once except for (yet):</p>
<ul>
<li>Idaho (either U of Idaho or Idaho State)</li>
<li>South Dakota (I work with a North Dakota grad)</li>
</ul>
<p>I only looked at contractors since federal employees probably make less the Google/Facebook/Microsoft/Apple folks. Us contractors get about $50,000 more for the same software job just by having the needed clearance and depending if we work for a consulting firm or go the 1099 route, can bill the Feds anywhere from $75 to $130 per hour.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Truth. Contracting is far more lucrative (more pay, better benefits, and less work) than your typical software engineer position at Google/FB/MS/Apple. It gets sick when you are also a reservist and your employer supports “differential pay” or better - double dipping when away for training, short term orders, or mobilization.</p>
<p>And the best part is that there are software jobs everywhere!</p>